yeah. i've been friends with people that have stabbed someone else in the back.

it's not that i think they wouldn't do the same thing to me...it's just that i know how to set it up so that it wouldn't be worth it for them to.

i dunno, it's kinda strange, i'll admit. i guess in some sense it's a power thing for me. it's like, i get some validation from the fact that they don't stab me in the back even though they have to others.

also, i feel like those people are written off by most, and i want them to know that i see them for what they really are. i want to help them, you know?

Now that I've found a site that explains, in depth, the differences in the four types, I definitely know that I (NF) am, without a doubt, an "S" and my fiance (SJ) is, without a doubt, a "D" (though he does fit the "C" type as well). Thinking of me being a "C" made me feel really uncomfortable, but I felt completely in the right place when reading the "S" traits.

For the most part, equal relationships are relationship first, then trust (this includes friends, my fiance, my neighbors, etc). I don't blindly trust anyone that is my equal or lower and I think they need to prove themselves before I trust them (INFP trait). However, when I am dealing with some in a higher position than me, I will trust them first and then develop the relationship (doctors, professors, landlord, etc). I almost feel like I have no choice but to trust them first and hope the relationship follows.

Thank you for that.
Actually, over at INFPglobal most INFP types scored as high S types or high C types, so you're right in there with them.

Some people need trust first, and some people need relationship first.

Want to talk about that?
I find that itself to be fascinating insight!

In my youth, trust was always a big issue for me. Later, in the military and the working world, I learned to work and live with all kinds and accept people as they are, even deeply flawed people. I don't necessarily need to trust people much. I just try to understand them so that I know where the relationships are solid vs. where they become shaky and unreliable.

In my youth, trust was always a big issue for me. Later, in the military and the working world, I learned to work and live with all kinds and accept people as they are, even deeply flawed people. I don't necessarily need to trust people much. I just try to understand them so that I know where the relationships are solid vs. where they become shaky and unreliable.

“Pleasure to me is wonder—the unexplored, the unexpected, the thing that is hidden and the changeless thing that lurks behind superficial mutability. To trace the remote in the immediate; the eternal in the ephemeral; the past in the present; the infinite in the finite; these are to me the springs of delight and beauty.” ~ H.P. Lovecraft

edit - there's one that I think belongs in the S list (though it doesn't begin with S), which is slightly different to 'steady': constant (as in constancy), cos that's me. Whilst I might seem unsteady and sorta dynamic/flexibly (wibbly-wobbly all over the place!), my attitude towards others is usually pretty constant; I don't tend to alter/transfer loyalties or affections at all easily, once bestowed.

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I've just had a thought that in actual fact my 'trust' with regard to other people, even total strangers, is more in myself than in them. I don't feel I need to be able to trust them that much, because I feel I can trust myself to be able to handle whatever they throw at me (dare I risk saying "with God's help"? ), and to turn it into something beneficial.

I think this is what enables me to deal quite happily and equally, to develop friendships of equal closeness with anything from drug addicts and convicts to upstanding pillars of the community. In the end, what they might or might not do is moot to me... it's about their humanity, and I can spot that a mile off in anyone, because obviously we are all human. And, relating to and having no end of compassion for that, it's a simple question of exercising varying levels of caution as I figure out and get to know better in what areas each individual can be trusted at any point in their personal journey. My feeling if 'crossed' isn't one of betrayal at all, but usually a choice or combination of confusion, frustration at myself (kicking myself for not having predicted it), compassion and desire to get things back to rights again. And that BOTH of us LEARN from it.

I always find it slightly confusing when people ask me to forgive them. I honestly, really don't feel there's anything to forgive.

One reason I find it so alien, the point I made earlier, about how it's alien to me this idea of considering what a person has to offer you when considering whether or not to embark on a road to friendship with them... well, that's alien to me because I tend to automatically assume everyone has something to offer everyone else - at the very least, life lessons! Every encounter can leave a mark and contribute and we often can't know what the eventual effect or benefit might be until years later even, when something we thought insignificant or the significance of which we misinterpreted, begins to kick in and take effect. So I don't know really how people can know how to prioritize the 'offerings' or potentials of other people in order to decide whether or not they're 'worthy'.